


That Boy

by WrathoftheStag (Mwuahna)



Series: The Supportive Parent Collection [4]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alicia POV, Alicia looks up Bitty, Alicia loves him, Falling In Love, Gen, M/M, Post graduation kiss, bitty's vlog, zimbits - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2019-06-20 23:14:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15544314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mwuahna/pseuds/WrathoftheStag
Summary: Alicia Zimmermann was nosy and she was not ashamed to admit it.  So when her husband told her he thought Jack had feelings for that cute Bittle boy, Alicia dove straight into the Google machine.





	That Boy

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place right after the graduation kiss. Jack is a smitten kitten.

Alicia Zimmermann was nosy. She was not ashamed to admit that--at all, in the slightest. Although she preferred the term inquisitive. It sounded nicer, and she just liked knowing things, you know? So when her husband, partner in crime and co-conspirator, told her he thought Jack had feelings for that cute Bittle boy, Alicia grabbed a giant cup of coffee and her laptop, settled into the couch, put on her reading glasses, and dove straight into the Google machine.

Eric Bittle, Samwell class of 2017. His Twitter _@omgcheckplease_ was the first thing that came up.

 _Baker, former figure skater, and the shortest member of the Samwell hockey team!_ his bio read. She scrolled down and noticed a tweet from just yesterday. All it read was _This boy_. 

“Hmm… interesting…” she said as took a sip of coffee.

She scrolled further down and frowned as she read about Eric’s sadness regarding commencement. So far, from what she just read, she liked Eric. She really did. He was funny, articulate, and sweet. 

_Hi, I'm Jack. Bittle thought it would be fun if I answered a few questions. Fire away._ Alicia laughed. Jack was such a social media-phobe, seeing this was quite the eye-opener.

“What are you doing?”

She jumped when Bob’s voice broke through her investigative cloud. 

“Jesus, Bobby! You just about gave me a heart attack.”

Bob chuckled and plopped down next to her. “So, what are you doing? You have your Up-to-No-Good face on.” 

He leaned in and pressed a kiss to her cheek before stealing her coffee away.

“Oh, nothing… Wait, where’s Jack?” She asked as she looked behind Bob.

“He just went out for a run. He actually slept in today! He was up pretty late last night. I got up for a cookie in the middle of the night and heard him on the phone with someone.”

“Would this someone happen to be a certain small, cute, blond forward? And I hope you didn’t finish all of those madeleines.”

Bob’s lips quirked into a tiny grin. “Ali, what did you find out?”

“Nothing, yet!” she said smugly. “But I’ll keep you posted.”

Bob threw his head back and laughed. “I’m sure you will. Well, I’ll let you get back to it.”

Bob left the living room and Alicia continued to go through Eric’s Twitter feed. 

She wanted to find out who that boy was, what his intentions were--if any--and just what kind of a person he was. Jack wasn’t naive, he wouldn’t let himself be fooled by anyone ever again, but still, her maternal instincts kicked in.

 _Embarrassing story I'll share with y'all. When I first met Bob Zimmermann I called him "Mr. Bad Bob" then followed up with "Mr. Jack's Dad."_

_He's cute, for sure,_ Alicia thought to herself. She scrolled further down. She saw a photo of Jack with his camera, in what appeared to be the haus kitchen. This must have been when they bought Eric that oven. She remembered when Jack called and asked Bob for advice on ovens. 

“Ovens?” Bob had questioned over speakerphone. “Why don’t you just get an apartment that already comes with one?”

“It’s not for me. Euh, it’s for the haus. For Bittle, actually.”

Alicia remembered how she laughed when she saw Bob’s expression as he pantomimed Jack’s heart beating fast. 

She clicked over to Eric’s Twitter photos and there was a picture of him with a shirtless (Of course!) Shitty. Eric wore some very cute short red shorts. She wondered who took that particular photo. 

Alicia kept going and a smile spread across her face when she spotted a photo from last Halloween. Eric was dressed as who she imagined being Mrs. Lovett from _Sweeney Todd_ , and Jack was actually in costume as well--a lazy, half-assed costume but a costume, nonetheless! 

She examined Jack's face; how carefree and open his smile was.

After spending an hour reading Eric’s entire Twitter feed, she was itching for more. Just then, the front door slammed.

“Shit,” she muttered as she closed her laptop and got up. “Jack, sweetheart? That you?”

“Yeah, maman. I’m back.”

She glanced at her laptop. _Soon_ , she thought. _Soon!_

**+**

“So have you talked to anyone from Samwell, yet?” Alicia asked nonchalantly, and to the point, during dinner.

Jack swallowed his fish, as he nodded. “Yeah, I was just texting with Bitty a little while ago.”

Bob paused mid-chew and shot her a quick look with a raised eyebrow.

“Oh, and how is he doing? Is he back home in Georgia?”

Jack smiled softly and nodded again.

Bob and Alicia exchanged a glance. Alicia cleared her throat and said, “He seems like a nice young man.”

Jack shrugged and then smiled again, this time with a blush. “He is.”

“He’s certainly come a long way since his first year at Samwell,” Bob said.

“He really has! You know, after his concussion, I wasn’t sure if he’d want to get back on the ice but this year he really showed how much of a team player he is--how he’s an integral part of the team. His speed, his soft hands, the way he just gets everyone’s strengths and weaknesses and helps in his own way. I mean, he was always an asset but he’s really shined this year. We’re really lucky to have him,” Jack said excitedly. “And even with all his baking and his vlog, he still has time to contribute. Did I ever tell you about the _tarte au sucre_ he made? It was amazing!”

Bob and Alicia exchanged another glance.

“No, tell us,” she said as she picked up her wine glass.

 

That night, Alicia climbed into bed and opened her laptop with a goofy grin.

“You’re going to try to find his vlog, aren’t you?” Bob said as he rolled over to face Alicia, his hair already in unruly cowlicks.

“Bobby, that was probably the most our son has ever said in a single breath, and it was all about Eric. So if you think for one moment I’m not going to investigate whether or not these two are, in fact, into each other and have a future together--fingers crossed--then you don’t know the gal you married.”

Bob laughed quietly. “I do know her. And I know you’ll give me all the details once you have them. Night, Ali.”

Alicia leaned over and kissed Bob. “Night, Bobby.” 

It took her a good 15 minutes but soon, there she was staring at one baby-faced Eric Bittle discussing graduating from high school and helping his MooMaw bake a graduation cake for his party.

_“Normally, I prefer pie but MooMaw’s pineapple upside cake is not to be missed. She made three of them for my party. Now, if you don’t have a cast iron skillet--no worries…”_

There were over one hundred videos. She looked at her clock. How long would it take to go through them all?

 

 _"But today, Jack chewed me out--in front of everyone. Again."_ She inhaled as she mentally chastised her emotionally stunted lug of a son.

 

 _"Apparently, asking a hockey player who Bob Zimmermann is like asking a figure skater who Michelle Kwan is."_ She snickered so loudly, Bob stirred in his sleep. 

 

 _“And then everybody hugged because for some reason that's what hockey bros do and it was so wonderful. You should have seen Jack's stupid face.”_

 

_“Jack Zimmermann works harder than god.”_

 

 _"Jack hates my guts. He just does. It's like, ever since I scored in that game against Yale, he's had it out for me."_

Alicia recalled the time when Jack was five. He had proclaimed his extreme hatred of granny smith apples. 

“But Jacky, you loved these last week,” Alicia had said as Jack petulantly flung an apple across the room.

“I don’t anymore, maman! I don’t.”

Later that week, Alicia saw Jack sitting quietly in the corner of their kitchen as he ate a granny smith apple.

“Did you change your mind about those?” Alicia had asked.

Jack solemnly shook his head. “No, maman. I didn’t hate them. I love granny smith apples SO MUCH! But I’m afraid that if I eat them all the time, they’ll disappear and then I’ll miss them... I’ll be sad.”

Alicia watched as Eric continued his tirade about Jack’s _stupid_ face. 

“Boys,” she sighed to herself.

 

And so, Alicia spent the next few days poring over Eric Bittle’s internet life, a cyber archeologist looking for clues into who that boy was. Alicia, like her son, soon fell in love and fell hard. She watched as Eric gushed over Jack's _spectacular_ playing and how their teamwork began to build and how their friendship grew. Eric began talking about Jack more and more as the vlog posts continued.

It was 3:00 a.m., on her third consecutive night of watching Eric’s vlog that Alicia had a tissue in her hand and clutched at her heart. She had just watched Eric tearfully cry out, “Never fall for a straight boy.”

“Oh, you sweetheart,” she muttered. “If you only knew… OR DO YOU?” She sniffed and dabbed at her eyes.

How was it possible that someone so sincere, so unbelievably sweet--who clearly cared for her son enormously--could actually exist? She just wanted to reach out and tell him that if he could make Jack half as happy as she knew he could, he would forever have a place in her heart.

After Eric’s last tweet, Alicia was worried that his Twitter had gone silent. Although Jack’s attitude had grown sunnier and sunnier as the days went by. 

 

“I’m heading to Madison for the fourth,” Jack said over the phone. He had been in Providence for several weeks now, but all three had weekly phone calls.

Alicia and Bob jumped up and down and swatted at one another, while Alicia covered a squeaked.

“What was that?” Jack asked.

“Oh, probably just static from the speakerphone,” Alicia said calmly. 

“Madison, huh? Eric invited you out there?” Bob asked.

“Euh, yes! Um, I think he wanted a bunch of us to visit--but, um, nobody else could get away.”

“That’s nice. Eric seems like such a good friend.”

“He is. I… I miss him, so it’ll be good to catch up.”

“Well, tell him we said hello and that he should come out here with you,” Alicia said and tried not to laugh as Bob did a celebratory dance in the background.

“Uh, sure? I guess?”

At this point, Bob was doing the Funky Chicken and Alicia had to cover her mouth.

“Jack, we have to let you go--but I’ll call you back in a little bit,” Alicia said as Bob snorted loudly.

“Oh god, you two aren’t in the middle of doing _it_? Are you?” Jack said with exasperation.

“No, sweetheart! Don’t be silly. We’ll call you back. Love you!”

“Bye,” Jack said and hung up.

“Holy moly, Bobby!”

“I know! It’s terrific!”

“Imagine how sweet our grandchildren will be?” Alicia said dreamily as she hugged Bob and looked up at his face.

“Aren’t you jumping ahead a little, Ali?” Bob asked as he looked down at her.

“Hello? Have you met our child? Mr. 110%? If they're dating, it _will_ be serious. You’ll see! And he’s perfect, Bobby. Just perfect!”

Bob smiled, with a twinkle in his eye, as the two hugged even tighter.

 

**Six Months Later...**

“I have some news,” Jack said over the phone.

“Oh?” Bob asked with fake sincerity. 

“Well, Bitty--Bittle and I, well... I talked to him and he said I could tell you, and I just, I--I don’t want to hide him, you know?”

“What is it, sweetheart?” Alicia asked as she winked at Bob.

“Bittle and I are dating. We've been together since May. And--and I love him,” Jack said.

“Jack, that’s terrific!” Bob said just at the same moment Alicia cried out, “MARRY THAT BOY, JACK!”

Bob turned over to look at Alicia with eyes wide, as she covered her mouth.

“Um, I mean, that’s great, Jack,” she added.

“Marry that boy?” Jack repeated. “Maman…”

Bob rolled his eyes and shot her a sarcastic thumbs up as she shrugged weakly.

“One day,” Jack said with a smile in his voice. “I promise.”

Alicia felt as though her heart might burst right through her chest and kill her dead on the spot. And she knew she didn’t mind, not one single bit. 

Those boys...

**Author's Note:**

> And you know this was [absolutely them](http://omgcheckplease.tumblr.com/post/154821659642) after the phone call:  
> 
> 
> All OMGCP characters belong to Ngozi.
> 
> Come and holler at me [on Tumblr](http://wrathofthestag.tumblr.com/).


End file.
